When digestion weighs you down, most people look for something to do, anything, to speed up the process. Ligeya Garza, yoga teacher at Cando Living, proposes just the opposite: listen before acting. “If we practice yoga we can connect with our body and listen to its needs, and thus be able to control, heal, and improve our health,” she explains. The postures, according to her, are a guide to accompany the natural functioning of the digestive system, not to force it.
There are four postures that Garza particularly recommends for heavy digestion. “Padottanasana with the feet a little apart helps us to relax the abdomen and activate the legs,” she notes. Adho Mukha Svanasana, with a good lengthening of the back, gives space for the organs to function better. Twists, or Parivrtta, “will always help us to cleanse and activate the digestive system.”
Supta Baddha Konasana occupies a special place on this list. “It would be the queen pose at a moment where we want to give space for the physical body to have all the energy and space to do its work,” Garza explains. All these postures share a single principle: they combine compression and extension of the torso, two movements that activate the body’s natural processes. “The postures will accompany our own biology to be able to feel better,” she sums up.
When to practice them and at what pace
There is no fixed rule valid for everyone. “Each body has its own timing and depends on each physiognomy and health,” Garza explains. Her general recommendation is simple: practice when your own body feels comfortable, without forcing the moment to follow an external guideline. “You are always your own teacher and it’s nice to take charge of your postures and your body.”
When the goal is more therapeutic, less is more. “Few postures and, if you can, a minimum of three to five minutes, with a deep and conscious breathing,” she notes. It’s not about chaining a long sequence, but about holding few postures long enough for the body to respond to them.
What to avoid after eating
Inversions are the main contraindication after a heavy meal. “They are not advisable because they do not help the body’s natural processes and could cause acidity,” Garza warns. In light of them, she again insists on the same posture: “Supta Baddha Konasana is always the best when seeking digestion.”
Can yoga quickly ease a heavy digestion? “Yoga can indeed help, because with the postures we will foster the proper functioning of the organs and of our mind,” Garza states. But the benefits accumulate over time more than with a single session: “You will surely notice more benefits if you have a continuous practice, and you’ll learn to listen better to your body, to control excesses and discomfort.”
At Cando Living, yoga is not understood as a one-off remedy for a bad digestion day. “We do not understand well-being as a one-off action, but as a way of life. That is why yoga is part of a 360-degree well-being proposal in which physical activity, nutrition, rest, prevention and social connection coexist,” Garza explains. The heavy digestion after a specific excess is only the doorway to a much broader approach to caring for the body.
Four postures, a few minutes and mindful breathing are, according to Garza, enough to accompany the body in its moments of greatest heaviness. Not as an immediate solution, but as part of a habit that, sustained over time, changes the way the body digests and recovers.
